Recipe: Wild garlic pesto

Whilst on our yurt holiday a couple of weeks ago we found something fantastic. Carpets of wild garlic. It was growing along country lanes and in damp woodland next to rivers and streams.

Carpet of wild garlic next to a stream

We could smell it before we saw it and with the help of our foraging book Food For Free, managed to successfully identify it as wild garlic (Ramsons).

Wild garlic flowersWild garlic leaves

Wild garlic pesto recipe

You will need:

A big bunch of wild garlic (enough to cover the bottom of a carrier bag)

Handful of parsley

50g parmesan cheese, finely grated

50g toasted walnuts or pine nuts

100ml olive oil / 150ml for thinner pesto

Lemon juice of 1/2 a lemon (or to taste)

I didn’t add salt to this recipe because the parmesan contains quite a bit and the wild garlic was really fresh so it had lots of flavour.

1. Wash your wild garlic

Pick out the healthiest, freshest leaves and rinse with cold water to remove bugs and dirt.

Foraged wild garlic leaves

Tip: make double sure you haven’t accidentally picked any weeds by sniffing the leaves (for garlic smell) before you rinse them. Also see ‘identifying wild garlic’ at the bottom of this post.

2. Toast your walnuts

Lightly toast the walnuts but do not let them burn.

3. Put all your ingredients except the olive oil in a food processor.

Put the wild garlic leaves, toasted nuts, finely grated parmesan and lemon juice into the food processor and blitz into a paste.

Rough wild garlic pesto paste

4. Add olive oil

With the motor running, slowly pour in your olive oil and blitz until thoroughly mixed. Add more lemon juice if required.

Fresh wild garlic pesto

5. Enjoy fresh or freeze

This pesto freezes well although it has a milder garlic flavour once defrosted. If eating fresh, don’t breathe on anyone for a couple of hours afterwards…unless they’ve been eating it too of course.

If you don’t want to make pesto with your wild garlic leaves, chop them up and add to risotto, pasta or stir fry. You can also make your own alioli style sauce by mixing chopped wild garlic leaves, mayonnaise and lemon juice.

Identifying wild garlic

Wild garlic is also known as Allium ursinum and Ramsons.

Crush the leaves slightly with your nail to see if they smell of garlic. Be careful not to pick the leaves of weeds or other plants growing in the same place. Do not mistake wild garlic for Lily of the Valley, which is poisonous. If you can’t confidently identify a plant (and the leaves) as wild garlic, do not eat it.